Editing Joseph McCarthy (section)

==="Enemies within"===
McCarthy experienced a meteoric rise in national profile beginning on February 9, 1950, when he gave a [[Lincoln Day]] speech to the Republican Women's Club of [[Wheeling, West Virginia]]. His words in the speech are a matter of some debate, as no audio recording was saved. However, it is generally agreed that he produced a piece of paper that he claimed contained a list of known Communists working for the [[United States Department of State|State Department]]. McCarthy is usually quoted to have said: "The State Department is infested with communists. I have here in my hand a list of 205—a list of names that were made known to the [[United States Secretary of State|Secretary of State]] as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working and shaping policy in the State Department."<ref>{{cite book |last = Griffith |first = Robert |title = The Politics of Fear: Joseph R. McCarthy and the Senate |url = https://archive.org/details/politicsoffearjo00grif |url-access = registration |publisher = University of Massachusetts Press |year=  1970 |page = [https://archive.org/details/politicsoffearjo00grif/page/49 49] |isbn = 0-87023-555-9}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Phillips |first=Steve |editor=Martin Collier, Erica Lewis |title=The Cold War |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=MlNaN_k4YtcC |access-date=December 1, 2008 |series= Heinemann Advanced History |year= 2001|publisher= Heinemann Educational Publishers|location= Oxford|isbn= 0-435-32736-4|page= 65|chapter= 5}}</ref>

There is some dispute with whether or not McCarthy actually gave the number of people on the list as being "205" or "57". In a later telegram to President Truman, and when entering the speech into the ''[[Congressional Record]]'', he used the number 57.<ref name="CongRec81">{{cite web
|url = http://www.wvculture.org/hiStory/government/mccarthy01.html
|title = Congressional Record, 81st Congress, 2nd Session
|access-date = August 11, 2006
|date = February 20, 1950
|publisher = West Virginia Division of Culture and History
|archive-date = September 25, 2009
|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090925175808/http://www.wvculture.org/history/government/mccarthy01.html
|url-status = dead
}}</ref>

The origin of the number 205 can be traced: in later debates on the Senate floor, McCarthy referred to a 1946 letter that then–Secretary of State [[James F. Byrnes|James Byrnes]] sent to Congressman [[Adolph J. Sabath]]. In that letter, Byrnes said State Department security investigations had resulted in "recommendation against permanent employment" for 284 persons, and that 79 of these had been removed from their jobs; this left 205 still on the State Department's payroll. In fact, by the time of McCarthy's speech only about 65 of the employees mentioned in the Byrnes letter were still with the State Department, and all of these had undergone further security checks.<ref>
{{cite book
  |last = Cook
  |first = Fred J.
  |title = The Nightmare Decade: The Life and Times of Senator Joe McCarthy
  |publisher = Random House
  |year=  1971
  |pages = 155–156
  |isbn = 0-394-46270-X}}
</ref>

At the time of McCarthy's speech, communism was a significant concern in the United States. This concern was exacerbated by the actions of the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe, the [[Chinese Civil War#Resumed fighting (1946–1949)|victory of the communists in the Chinese Civil War]], the Soviets' [[Soviet atomic bomb project|development of a nuclear weapon]] the year before, and by the contemporary controversy surrounding [[Alger Hiss]] and the confession of Soviet spy [[Klaus Fuchs]]. With this background and due to the sensational nature of McCarthy's charge against the State Department, the Wheeling speech soon attracted a flood of press interest in McCarthy's claim.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/mccarthy-says-communists-are-in-state-department|title=McCarthy says communists are in State Department|website=History|language=en|access-date=January 17, 2020|archive-date=January 28, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200128183417/http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/mccarthy-says-communists-are-in-state-department|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8369.html|title=McCarthy targets 'communists' in government Feb. 9, 1950|last=Andrew Glass|website=Politico|date=February 9, 2008|language=en|access-date=January 17, 2020|archive-date=December 4, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081204023940/http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8369.html|url-status=live}}</ref>